Crime
The Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety is involved in numerous projects related to guns, gangs, and drugs. Faculty and staff affiliated with the Center focus on these issues in a variety of ways. While many of our faculty and staff engage in research examining the scope, nature and root cause of these problems, others advise federal, state and local policymakers on how to most effectively respond to them, and still others are involved in evaluating related programs, projects, and strategies.
Arizona Arrestee Reporting Information Network (AARIN)
The Arizona Arrestee Reporting Information Network (AARIN) is modeled after the discontinued Arizona ADAM project. The AARIN program has initiated data collection in Maricopa County, under a grant from the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors. However, we continue to work on extending the AARIN program in Pima County and in other regions of the state. Pima County was an ADAM site from 1998 to 2003. The data collection strategy for the AARIN sites includes quarterly samples of adult males, adult females, juvenile males, and juvenile females.
Based upon a proven research model employed by NIJ, the AARIN provides a cost effective means for an early monitoring and warning system pertaining to drug usage of arrestees in Arizona. The purpose of the project is to provide meaningful information to Arizonan researchers and policy makers in assessing the impact of substance abuse upon the adult criminal and juvenile justice systems, as well as provide them with a research platform for evaluating other important issues, programs, and policies focused on this population.
AARIN is a two component system for monitoring trends among the arrestee population. The components consist of a questionnaire administered to a sample of arrestee within 48 hours of their arrest and a voluntary urine specimen provided by the arrestee. Data collection takes place for a two week period once each calendar quarter in every AARIN data collection site. In most sites over 90 percent of the arrestees asked to participate agree to be interviewed and over 90 percent provide a urine sample.
CJRAIG: Criminal History Records Sex Offender Study
The Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety submitted this proposal in partnership with the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission's Statistical Analysis Center and the Criminal Justice Research Advisory and Information Group (CJRAIG). The research project was awarded through the Justice Research and Statistics Association and will seek replicate a study conducted by the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 2001. The multi state study will compare recidivism rates of convicted sex offenders with that of the general offender population. A data extract will be requested from the Arizona Department of Corrections and submitted to the Arizona of Department of Public Safety's Arizona Computerized Criminal History (ACCH) database. The project is scheduled for completion in February of 2007.
A Study of Sex Offender Clustering in Phoenix, Arizona
In September 2005, Phoenix City Council, through the Phoenix Police Department, contracted with ASU's Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety to conduct a multidimensional study examining potential problems associated with the clustering of sex offenders. The study involves examining four dimensions of sex offender clustering: 1) the nature and impact in time and space of sex offender clustering; 2) the offense patterns and trajectories of sex-offenders; 3) the social and psychological impact of sex offender clustering on neighborhood-residents, and 4) the impact of sex offender clusters on constituent sex offenders.
As part of the project the Center is surveying 800 Phoenix residents in areas with high, medium, and low concentration of sec offenders; interviewing 100 registered sex offenders, and examining the official records of all registered sec offenders residing in Phoenix, Arizona. Additionally, the Center will be examining the effects of sex offender clustering on neighborhood crime rates.
Arizona Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) Arrestee Survey Project
The Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety at ASU was contracted by the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission (ACJC) to develop a survey instrument and methodological strategy to collect data on guns, gangs and drugs from those recently arrested in the city of Phoenix. Over the past year the Center has conducted over 800 interviews with arrestees and the data has been used by the Phoenix Police Department and Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN) Partners for the purposes of strategic planning.
An Evaluation of the Kino Weed and Seed Coalition: A Process and Impact Evaluation
Established in 2001, the Kino Weed and Seed Coalition includes representatives from a variety of government and non-profit groups. The coalition is a grassroots, community-based group whose mission is to foster and maintain a vital, safe, drug-free community. In 2004, the Kino Weed and Seed Coalition applied for and received a Drug Free Communities Grant which allows for the leveraging of additional resources.
The coalition employs numerous strategies across multiple domains to address community problem areas with a focus on youth substance abuse. Strategies used include life skills training, parent education, social marketing, public information, community mobilization, and environmental strategies within a Selective Prevention framework. There are two primary objectives of the coalition which are: (1) to reduce substance abuse amongst neighborhood youth by reducing risk and increasing protective factors, and (2) to maintain and strengthen collaboration among youth, adults, families, governments, agencies, institutions and businesses in the community to support coalition efforts to reduce substance abuse. The Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety has contracted with the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission (ACJC) to evaluate the Kino Weed and Seed Coalition project with funding provided by the Justice Research and Statistics Association.
Evaluations of the Canyon Corridor and Orchard Glen Weed and Seed Coalitions
Currently the Center is engaged in working with two other Weed and Seed Communities located in Phoenix (Canyon Corridor) and Glendale (Orchard Glen). Using a similar strategy as the Kino Weed and Seed Community evaluation, researchers will be able to provide a useful tool for the coalitions to evaluate and assess their site's needs, successes, and challenges, providing critical guidance in efforts to improve the work they do in their neighborhoods.
